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While we’re used to seeing celebrities in front of the camera, there are plenty of celebrities who love going behind the lens. From famous musicians to award-winning actors, these celebrities use photography as a different creative outlet. Many also frequently exhibit their work and have published photography books.

Take a look at 11 famous celebrities who are also accomplished photographers. Some of the names on the list may surprise you.

These are 11 celebrities who also happen to love photography.

Jessica Lange

Academy Award-winning actor Jessica Lange is also an accomplished photographer who studied the craft at the University of Minnesota. While she focused on other creative outlets after her time there, she took up photography again in the late 1990s when her former partner Sam Shepherd gifted her a Leica camera. She has since published several photography collections and was honored with the George Eastman Honors Award, which is given out by the world’s oldest international museum of photography and film. Her latest book, Dérive, is a collection of street photography taken in New York during the pandemic.

Ben Affleck

Actor and director Ben Affleck has been a photographer since high school and is a self-professed camera geek. He has a large collection of lenses and cameras and showed off his extensive knowledge of the subject in a funny scene from wife Jennifer Lopez’s documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told. In it, Affleck enthusiastically points out all of the equipment available inside a camera truck on set, which caused Lopez to tease, “Oh, this is your fantasy truck!”

In a 2023 interview, Affleck discussed his love for photography, telling the interviewer, “Man, I get made fun of. It’s a very serious addiction.”

Lenny Kravitz

While he’s best known for his music and acting, Lenny Kravitz also has a strong affinity for photography. This isn’t surprising, considering that his father was a journalist. In fact, he’s collaborated with Leica several times to create limited-edition cameras, and, in 2015, he published Flash. This collection of black and white images captures what it’s like to be on the receiving end of paparazzi attention.

“I love storytelling and I have an interesting life in that I’m all over the place with people of every culture and age and background, rich or poor; I love people and that’s the driver for me, I love humanity,” he told GQ Australia about his love for photography.

Bryan Adams

Rock star Bryan Adams is also well known for his second career as a photographer. He’s shot a wide range of imagery, from fashion photography to album covers to photos that raise awareness for charitable causes. He was selected to photograph Queen Elizabeth II several times, and one of his images of her and Prince Philip is now in the National Portrait Gallery in London. In 2021, he was selected to shoot the acclaimed Pirelli Calendar, and his work is regularly exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide.

Gary Oldman

#WorldPhotographyDay
Gary Oldman working at his home studio pic.twitter.com/dGrhxwY8D8

— Gary Oldman Web (@GaryOldmanWeb) August 19, 2023

Actor Gary Oldman often takes photographs on set, and these insider glimpses of filmmaking have been exhibited internationally. He’s also passionate about wet plate photography and has a home studio that allows him to process the imagery using the early 19th-century process. “There’s just a sort of, magic to it […] There’s something very beautiful about the whole process.” he once shared when discussing how he learned it. “I feel like I sort of had my creative purpose back.”

Helena Christensen

Supermodel Helena Christensen certainly knows fashion, and she’s transferred this into a successful career as a photographer. Both her father and grandfather were avid photographers, and she used her time as a model to absorb the lessons of the great photographers she worked with. Her photos have been published in Nylon—which she co-founded—Marie Claire, and Elle, among other publications. Christensen also frequently exhibits her work and, since 2019, has used her role as a goodwill ambassador for the UNHCR to tell the stories of people living in refugee camps.

“It is a big dream of mine to work for a newspaper or for Magnum Photos—I always keep that goal in my mind. Photojournalism is so enriching; I love capturing a split-second of life,” she told Harper’s Bazaar in a 2023 interview.

Viggo Mortensen

Viggo Mortensen’s photography pic.twitter.com/m0nDnCnYV5

— Felix ²² ❤️‍ (@ragged_reeling) June 13, 2023

Viggo Mortensen may be best known for his role as Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, but he is also a painter and photographer. He used part of his earnings from the famous trilogy to start Perceval Press, which specializes in art, critical writing, and poetry. It’s also the home of Mortensen’s personal projects, which include many books of poetry and photography. His latest work, Look, asks readers to take in the imagery without a preconceived notion and celebrates beauty in the ordinary world.

Aaron Eckhart

Aaron Eckhart likes using his acting skills to tell stories through his photography. “I’m really just a photography geek,” he once declared. “I just love to shoot.” While considering photography a hobby, he’s used his skills to do everything from jewelry campaigns to humanitarian collaborations with organizations like AmeriCares.

Lucy Liu

Lucy Liu is much more than a Charlie’s Angel. Liu is also an accomplished visual artist who incorporates photography into her mixed-media work. Photography is an important part of Liu’s artistic career, and her first solo exhibition, in 1993, was a photographic exhibition in New York City that earned her a grant to study at Beijing Normal University. Liu has continued cultivating her visual arts career alongside her acting and frequently exhibits her work internationally.

Jeff Bridges

For over 30 years, actor Jeff Bridges has used a Widelux F8—a specialized panoramic camera—to capture life on set. Bridges has a whole area of his website dedicated to his photography practice and has published two books, Pictures and Pictures, Volume 2. A photographer since high school, his work has been shown in numerous magazines, and he’s exhibited internationally. In 2013, the International Center of Photography honored him with an Infinity Award.

Nikki Sixx

Motley Crüe bassist Nikki Sixx is a dedicated Leica user who frequently publishes his work on a dedicated Instagram account. The rocker began his journey with photography after he became sober and once declared, “I’m a recovering addict. Cameras are my new drug.” Sixx mainly focuses on street photography and has exhibited his work at the Los Angeles Leica Gallery. His book, This is Gonna Hurt, combines his images with prose to gain a deeper insight into his life.

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Brian Tremblay is well-known in the local community for his photography, freelance work with CBC Radio and other news agencies, as the creator and host of Borderline Radio’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven, and as a long-time musician.

But that wasn’t always the case.

Back in high school, Tremblay helped manage local bands rather than play in them.

“I’ve been playing since I was 13 or 14,” says Tremblay, noting that there were a lot of stops and starts in his own musical journey.

“Unfortunately, back then I got discouraged a lot because I always compared myself to others, so I felt I wasn’t good enough.”

So instead, he booked shows for friends’ bands and assisted with their promotion.

Band promotion required band photographs, so Tremblay took those as well.

Many years later, it was Tremblay’s wife Lynn Eckroth, a touring musician before she moved to the Sault, who encouraged the artist to challenge himself with music.

The couple were known to perform cover songs as a duo for many years under the moniker of Taste of Honey.

“I asked her what she thought about me trying to write a song,” he says, noting that she has been his biggest fan and toughest critic.

“She encouraged me to go for it.”

So he did and has been actively promoting his original music ever since.

These days, Tremblay’s original music and photography have very much intermingled.

Back in January 2023, Tremblay organized a photo exhibit he called “The Neighbourhood” to be held at The Art Hub.

Tremblay’s photos in the exhibit were of the Steelton neighbourhood where he grew up.

“[I] realized after I had finished hanging the show, that I had songs that were inspired by growing up on Morin Street … that [went] along with these images.”

So the artist decided to perform those songs and tell stories about his memories during the photo exhibition.

The show sold out and was considered a great success.

“Many of my old neighbours, friends and folks who lived in the area came,” says Tremblay.

“I never thought the photos and music had a symbiotic relationship until the idea for this show came along.”

Coming off the success of the exhibit and performance, Tremblay decided to produce an album of those songs.  

His first full album of original music, The Neighbourhood: Songs &Stories of a Blue Collar Raising, was born.

The press release for the new album notes that the songs are “a musical journey for the listener” and tell the story of “family, love, life, growing up, riding bikes and playing with friends.”

Tremblay says the first single from the album, “Steel Ponies,” is about the “sheer joy of just riding bicycles around the neighbourhood and having adventures.”

Another track, “A Hole Where You Used to Be,” is a touching tribute to his late sister, Izzy.

The album release event, like the exhibit that inspired its creation, will be a live performance with projected visuals of the photographs he has taken.

The Neighbourhood: Songs & Stories of a Blue Collar Raising will be first released on CD and to all the streaming services, but Tremblay hopes to put out a limited edition of it on vinyl soon.

“I’d love to put out the album on vinyl because it just fits the time period I’m writing about,” he says.

“Maybe I want to do it because I just want to see it on an LP. I do love the warmth of the sound and the fact that you are listening to an entire album and that’s the best way to listen to music, instead of shuffle.”

The release event will be held at the North Branch of the Sault Ste. Marie Library.

“The space kind of found me,” says Tremblay, noting his enjoyment of playing non-traditional performance spaces.

“Libraries are often looking for programming, so I sent some information along to them and they got back to me saying they’d love to do it as part of their Signature Series of events. I was honoured and thrilled.”

The Neighbourhood: Songs & Stories of a Blue Collar Raising

Thursday, May 16, 2024. Doors at 6:00 pm. Performance at 6:30 pm.

North Branch of the Sault Ste. Marie Public Library (232 – C, Northern Ave E);

Tickets are $10 and available at both library locations.

For more information about Brian Tremblay and his music and art, visit his website here.

Kyotographie takes place at a time when the sakura (cherry blossoms) are in full bloom, and the beauty of Kyoto, Japan’s ancient imperial capital, is hard to miss when exploring the photography festival’s programme—organised into 13 exhibitions scattered throughout the city. Each venue, from the Kyoto National Museum to a former kimono factory, to a building designed by Tadao Ando, adds to the unique character of the event, which has built a reputation for the emphasis it places on stagecraft and setting.

As the festival’s co-founder Lucille Reyboz points out, this approach is linked to Japanese tradition: “In any Japanese ceremony, from a tea ceremony to a theatrical performance, the journey to reach the moment is as important as the moment itself. It’s the same for the presentation of exhibitions: the way visitors are led to engage with a story is crucial.” Some of the programming occupies heritage sites with numerous restrictions, which has, on several occasions in this edition encouraged creative responses from both artists and scenographers.

The photographer Thierry Ardouin, for example, has collaborated with the designer Shinichiro Ogata to adapt his Seed Stories for display in the former kitchens of Nijō Castle. This long-term project, originally conceived as a book (published by Atelier EXB in 2022), is a celebration of the aesthetics of seeds that also addresses some of the history and the cultural, scientific and ecological questions they raise. Ogata has created scenography around the concepts of yin and yang, showing Ardouin’s works on screen angled in such a way as to put them in conversation with the shadow and natural light in the building.

A retrospective of work by Viviane Sassen, held at the Maison Européenne de la Photographie in Paris last autumn, is, meanwhile, re-imagined in a former printing house. This concrete space, without any natural light, offers a stark contrast to the private mansion that hosted the original show—and brings the Dutch photographer’s experimentation and pioneering use of colour to the fore in an entirely different way. According to the curator Clothilde Morette, the Parisian exhibition took a more historical approach, while this latest presentation is more focused on the formal aspects of the artist’s work.

Reyboz says that the emphasis on staging and scenography is partly about a desire to address difficult topics in a way that resonates with, and does not come across as too direct for, local audiences. “Everything is possible in Japan, but it all depends on how you package things. Scenographies are essential because they allow us to create a bridge to sensitive subjects. It is thanks to this that the festival was able to function here.”

Among the exhibitions Reyboz picks out with this in mind is Claudia Andujar’s collaboration with the indigenous Yanomami people of Brazil, who have long faced battles against oppression. For Reyboz, their cause resonates with the fate of the Ainu, an indigenous people of Japan’s Hokkaido island. In the show, the visitor weaves between Andujar’s photographs and the testimonies of the Yanomami—expressed through drawings and videos as well as texts from their spokesperson, the shaman Davi Kopenawa—before entering a structure, shaped to reflect Yanomami architecture, where a video installation explores the increasing violence against these people on the part of the Brazilian government.

On the other side of Kyoto’s Kamo-gawa River, homage is paid to the struggle of Iranian women for their freedom. Titled You don’t die and conceived by the French newspaper Le Monde, this exhibition recounts, image by image, the events following the death of the student Mahsa Amini in September 2022. Amini died in a hospital after being detained by Iran’s morality police for allegedly not complying with the country’s regulations around hijabs.

At the Kyocera Museum of Art, which is taking part in Kyotographie for the first time, is an exhibition supported by the luxury group Kering’s Women in Motion programme, which each year brings together the work of two Japanese photographers from different generations.

There, two very intimate series by Rinko Kawauchi focused on her family are paired with works by Tokuko Ushioda, in what is the latter’s first major exhibition, at the age of 84. Ushioda’s work on view here—from a series of photographs of refrigerators taken over a 20-year period to snapshots of her home—are as humorous as they are poetic.

Other exhibitions feature artists who have pushed the boundaries of photography to their limits. There is a show of work by the Chinese duo Birdhead, for example—consisting of Song Tao and Ji Weiyu—who explored the formal and spiritual possibilities of the medium to the extent of imagining a “phototheist” religion. And another dedicated to the Irish photographer Eamonn Doyle, whose multi-screen video and sound installation takes viewers on fragmented journey through the streets of his hometown of Dublin.

Finally, Lucien Clergue, the founder of the photography festival Rencontres d’Arles, is honoured in an exhibition featuring his works spanning multiple decades— his photographs focused on Romani communities in Arles in the 1950s among them. It is a double tribute, since Rencontres d’Arles was an inspiration behind the establishment of Kyotographie in 2013.

• Kyotographie 2024, various venues across Kyoto, Japan, until 12 May

The last time we talked about the Berlin-based Italian photographer Edward Nurton was on the occasion of his photographic series entitled “Cellophane” in which he analysed the world of ties between people made up of separations, distances and distances. Now, Edward Nurton is back with another project that does not just analyse ties, but creates them. 

The project “Scura è la selva”, whose title pays homage to Dante Alighieri and creates a bridge between the beauty of the mind and the chaos of the subconscious, relates two apparently distant worlds, that of nature and that of street art. The young photographer documented the work of Lugosis, Paolo, Piña, and Strato, four street artists, at work in the Moabit area of Berlin. 

He then merged the shots showing walls and spray cans with photographs taken in the Grunewald forest, just outside the city. 

By juxtaposing the images, Edward Nurton creates a profound connection between human creativity and the beauty of nature in what becomes a hymn to freedom from different points of view. 

“The fusion of these two different paths creates a profound connection between the freedom of human creativity and the strength and beauty of the nature around us.”

The “Scura è la selva” series has been collected by Edward Nurton in a zine of the same name available in a limited edition. Follow the photographer on Instagram to make sure you don’t miss all the news.